Teaching and Traveling: Bangkok 2013-2014

Chuc Mung Nam Moi, Happy New Year!

Don't take pictures of fireworks, just sit back and enjoy them..... so I took one picture, to capture two of the four launch sites that we could see.

We spent New Years in Bangkok, Thailand, watching the fireworks from the pool at the Novotel. We could see four firework shows and hear one or two more. The reflections off of all the other tall buildings was pretty cool.

I (Jeff) have been to Bangkok and up to Chang Mai, but it had been about 15 years since then. It was interesting to revisit places as an adult. The giant reclining Buddha was exactly as I remembered it, and I tend to forget a lot. It was impressive enough to stick in my mind like a photograph. I did enjoy looking at the walls that are painted with scenes of village life all the way up to the roof ~30-40 feet up. I'll stop reminiscing and start talking about what we did on this trip.

Elephants! Janet loves elephants and this was her first time touching one!
It was at the Siam Niramit show, a fantastic history of Thailand. The show is the highlight of the entire area. Like Jakarta's Taman Mini, there are traditional Thai houses set up around a little pond. People are in traditional dress with different snacks are in the houses to show you how to weave and other stuff like that.
The show was as good as anything I've seen in Vegas and Broadway. It tells the history of Thailand with elephants, goats, an on stage river full of boats, flying gods and rain.

Samsung store at the Siam Paragon was selling Windows 8 on every computer except for this one. I didn't see a similar model to compare if the price was lower since you wouldn't be paying for Windows. Ubuntu is on a number of computers for sale around Hanoi as well. I'm running Lubuntu now and haven't tried Mint yet.

Need a Mazarati, Porsche, Lotus or BMW, pick one out while your kids try on clothes. 3rd floor of course.

Beautiful record player with a sweet looking amp below. There was a ton of really artsy unique and shiny audio pieces.

Worse than 1 ply? 1 ply 3" by 5" napkins and it was the same in most bathrooms. Informative, I know.

CheckMate wasn't playing. There is an imax and a 4DX theater. I was set on going to a 4DX movie now matter what it was. The Hobbit had just been replaced by 47 Ronin. The previews looked awful, but the movie was actually pretty good... or it was the extra DX...
First of all it is a 3D movie, and 47 Ronin looked really good in 3D, better than Oz. Your seat shakes, it can be a bit jarring, but is fun. I didn't realize that there was water. It is just a bit of mist that hits your face when ever someone crashes through water on screen. The first time I got blasted it was such a surprise that it felt like a hose. There wasn't enough water to bother wiping off. When arrows are shot you get a blast of air in your ear, it's awful. I then remembered that I'm tall. When I slouched down a bit the arrows seemed to sail past my head and the effect was pretty cool. They sent smells out two or three times, it was hard to notice. Over all, worth the $12 or $14, it made 47 Ronin fun and I'd do it again.

If you have any idea why these penguins and polar bears are pink, let me know.

Found a few packs of Indomie at 7-11 and demanded everything else in stock. Brought back about 25 and it was the best purchase of the trip.

Also, 7-11 needs to chill out on franchising in Bangkok. On Silom road we left a 7-11, and could actually see one down an alley, one to our left on a cross street and one about 100 yds in front of us. We passed two more on the other 800 m back to the hotel.

Took the boat tour to the Temple of Dawn and the boat toured around a few other temples. Not great, not bad. The catfish were out of control, being fed with entire loaves of bread - not ripped up or sliced, just whole loves.

I thought it said Monkey DeeJay... because that could be a thing in Bangkok, and a Monkey DJ would be awesome. The fact that I could logically have that thought, (and for that matter, a Monkey DJ in Hanoi would shock me 0%, and I would go)...reminds me how much fun it can be to live in Asia.

I didn't travel with a proper computer, something that hasn't happened in a while. I couldn't get the SIM card to connect to 3G on my phone, so I looked up the names and addresses of every place that we wanted to visit and snapped a picture of it on my phone. Worked great.

We had dinner at Than Ying which was lovely. We didn't have reservations but arrived early enough to grab a table ... as long as we promised to be gone by 8. The ambiance and decorations were nice, the food was really good and the rice was fancy and wore a hat to dinner.

We took one of the set tours that go up to the floating markets, an elephant ride, and finally end up at the tiger and elephant shows. Very touristy, but the tour guide was very good and it was so easy to do it all on the bus with out having to think about where we were going next or what we were doing next.

Just like I like to narrate each pictures (I had to restrain myself from stating that in the pictures above, it is the floating markets and that is Janet....ground breaking information... and I lost restraint and typed it anyways)

This t-shirt is the equivalent of my blogging.

The pythons are very drugged and so are the two Pomeranians that they place on your lap while the snake sleeps on your shoulder for the picture. Why add the dog? Well the guys across the street didn't have any dogs, just an albino snake, so as a tourist you get to vote with your Bhat - dogs or albino snakes, who do you support.... or maybe just keep your money in your pocket.

These wood carving places were tourist trap type stores but the carvings were amazing.

We were told that the tigers were just sleepy during the day and we could go pet them. I'm going to say that they were drugged and we opted out of paying for a picture with them.